Sunday, February 10, 2008

Jicama Salad

Jicama is also known as Yam Bean, Mexican Turnip or Mexican Potato and they are now being grown in Tasmania.

The taste can be described as a cross between apple, radish and water chestnut and it has a slightly fermented apple scent. Though it looks like a root vegetable it is classed as a legume as it grows on a vine.

It can be eaten raw and is prized for its crisp, clean taste - it also remains crisp if cooked. When choosing Jicama it is best to look for firm, dry specimens.

Jicama contains Vitamins A, B6, C and E, Folate, Niacin, Pantothenic Acid and Riboflavin along with Calcium, Copper, Iron, Magnesium, Manganese, Phosphorus, Potassium, Selenium and Zinc. It is also low in Sodium and high in Fibre.

Since this is a brand new ingredient for me I decided I wanted to make something that wouldn't hide the flavour of the Jicama and something light and fresh for summer. So I've come up with a really simple salad of jicama, apple, plum and refreshing mint dressed with citrus notes in the form of lime juice and orange-infused Olive oil.

Place the Jicama, Apple and Plums into a bowl along with a generous amount of shredded mint. Toss and then season with a dressing made of lime juice and orange-infused olive oil.

If you can't find orange-infused olive oil then add a little orange juice and a good fruity olive oil.

Place the salad onto a serving plate and then add a little more shredded mint leaves.

This makes a great companion to grilled prawns and scallops - the crispness of the salad combined with the slight tartness of the plums and dressing work well to balance out the sweet notes of seafood.

14 comments:

Beautiful photography, as always, and OHHHHHH, how I miss jicama. Try it in those lovely matchsticks with a bit of chili powder and drizzled with lime juice on a very hot day -- that's the lazy way to do a salad. Yours looks quite nice and sophisticated with the apples and plums. I hope we can find some of these in the UK, but it may be a challenge!! (wonder if they'll grow here...)

Your salad looks just gorgeous. I bet it's delicious with the fruit flavors. I love the crispiness of jicama, and actually I'm making a salad today that has cabbage and jicama. I had no idea it was classed as a legume, very interesting.

haalo, you are constantly amazing me with the weird and wonderful foods you cook with - I read about them in books and you are finding them in Melbourne - makes me feel I need to get out more and find these things

I have a book with a few jimaca recipes and have been curious about it so interesting to hear it is being grown sort of locally

I tried this salad and it was delicious! I couldn't get my hands on orange-infused olive oil, but I found some 'orange muscat champagne vinegar' at the whole foods store, which I mixed with a liffle olive oil and it worked beautifully

My daughter introduced jicama to me today and I dropped by Wal-Mart on my way home to purchase my very own. The texture is most interesting and I plan to mix it with avocado in my first recipe. I think any citrus fruit will go well with jicama. It's always fun to discover something new.